


the sixth star, ascended

by revolutionarygold



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Baby Fic, Canon Divergance, Discussion of Abortion, F/M, Mentions of Scanlan Shorthalt, Motherhood, discussion of parental abandonment, reference sexual content but it's fade to black, starts at the gray hunt and deviates from there, takes place during the time skip, tiefling aasimar babies, vexahlia has a lot of thoughts about her mother
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-14 18:07:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29546292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/revolutionarygold/pseuds/revolutionarygold
Summary: Percy and Vex bear the consequences of their extraplanar activities a little earlier than they might have expected to.During the year-long timeskip, Vex discovers that they'll be adding to Vox Machina's family and faces down her pregnancy and motherhood in the way she always has: with a slow breath, steady hands, and Percy at her back. That doesn't mean she's ready, of course, but it makes her as ready as she'll ever be.
Relationships: Keyleth/Vax'ildan (Critical Role), Percival "Percy" Fredrickstein Von Musel Klossowski de Rolo III/Vex'ahlia, Vex'ahlia & Vox Machina
Comments: 9
Kudos: 52





	the sixth star, ascended

She drags herself into her room - her and Percy’s room - it’s not official, he hasn’t officially moved in, but it might as well be official-

It doesn’t matter. She drops Fenthras, drops herself onto her bed and talks with her brother for a while - it makes more sense in the morning, after she’s slept, and she feels a little bit of the loss of it then - but at this point she feels elation, adrenaline, bile, and exhaustion all creeping up on her. Trinket thumps in her necklace, beating like a second heartbeat against her chest.

When Vax leaves, she summons him out, curls up with him like she did when they were both much younger, much smaller, much less sure of themselves, but just as bloody and dirty as they currently are. 

She sleeps, and she dreams, eventually, of the warmth of the sun on her face, of leaves under her bare feet, and of the wind in her hair. 

* * *

When Vex - _Lady Vex'ahlia of the Third House, Mistress of the Grey Hunt_ \- woke up, her hair was matted with sweat and blood and bear drool. She felt the previous day settle around her, like a mantle, like Keyleth’s mantle. Her knees were stiff from sitting under the Sun Tree for so long, and her arms were still cut up from her ill-advised tumble through the branches, and her thighs would be sore for a while, probably, but her hands were strong and steady and sure, calloused after years of archery and a little less time with her broom, and the responsibility and joy took roost in equal parts in her chest. 

Trinket snuffled as she started to sit up and disengage from her bear, woke up with her just like he always did. 

She touched his wet nose and kissed him between his eyes.

“You are a very good bear, darling,” she murmured, “and you did very well yesterday. Sleep as long as you need, and I’ll bring you all the meat pies you could want.”

He lowed at her, rumbling the floor underneath him, and settled back down into the nest of blankets and pillows. _We’re getting soft,_ Vex thought fondly. Too long in castles and magic mansions and keeps had made them too accustomed to beds and blankets and pillows and warmth. 

Maybe that wasn’t quite a bad thing. Maybe they’d been running for too long. Maybe it was time to make a home. 

But first, it was time to a nice, long soak in one of Percival’s lovely, deep, warm bathtubs. She thought, briefly, about inviting him into that bathtub, but she thought better of it. It might be nice to sit in the peace and the quiet after such an intense day of adrenaline and crashing through trees. 

* * *

Her hair wet and braided back, in soft and miraculously clean clothing, Vex made her way down the hall to her lover’s chambers. She let herself in; after that first...conversation they’d had, when he had come to her door, there had been very little modesty between the two of them.

“Oh, Vex, darling, good morning.”

He didn’t even look up at the sound of the door; he was bent over his handiwork on his desk, the magnifiers flipped down over his delicate little clockwork gears. It was a good day, when Percival was working on clocks instead of firing mechanisms. 

“Good morning, love.”

He looked up at that, quickly, a bit of grease smudged over his forehead, his hands impossibly steady. He was the first person she’d met who had that same stillness, that exactness in his hands and his wrists. It was impossibly attractive. 

“How is the Mistress of the Grey Hunt faring this morning?” he asked, a smile taking over his face despite his best efforts.

“Oh,” Vex tried for flippancy even as she prowled toward him with languid, deliberate, long strides, “Fine. Clean, finally, though a bit...neglected.”

It was impossible to miss how he caught around her hips as she walked, though Vex thought he was making a valiant effort to meet her eyes. She cocked an eyebrow at him as she closed the distance between the two of them and stood in front of him with her hands settled on those hips he was having a hard time looking away from. 

“Well, how would my Lady Vex’halia best like to remedy that neglect?” She could see his hands visibly twitching - there was no sign of the steadiness she’d admired a moment ago now that he had something to anticipate - but he was still trying to maintain this facade they were playing out. She appreciated him for that, but it had been a long few days, and Vex was patient, but not this patient.

She dropped into his lap, draped her arms around his neck. 

“I think you are more than capable of fixing this, darling,” she murmured. 

* * *

It wasn’t a surprise when her brother and Keyleth left to return to Zephra. Keyleth had been training for this role ever since Vex had known the red haired woman, and Vax had made it abundantly clear that he would follow her to the ends of the world. Just because it wasn’t a surprise that they left at the end of the week didn’t mean it was easy.

He held onto her, tightly, for a long time. The raven feathers at his shoulders tickled her nose, distrubed her own blue feathers, but Vex just pressed closer against her twin. They had never faced a separation like this, one where they chose (and chose happily!) to go their separate ways for an indeterminate amount of time.

That he was involved with a woman who could instantly transport anywhere with a sufficiently sized tree eased the old panic that was rooting in Vex’s stomach, but it couldn’t release it entirely. She felt six years old again, hugging her mother for the last time before their father took them away to that horrible place.

_It’s different,_ Vex told herself, firmly, in her oldest and most adult voice possible, _you are a grown woman, a slayer of dragons, savior of Emon and the world, really, and Thordak is dead. You will see him again._

“Will you come visit in a week or so?” Vax asked, his voice impossibly small. After all that had happened, it was hard to remember that Vax was younger than her, sixteen minutes be damned. 

“Of course, darling. You’ve seen so much of Whitestone, it’s only fair.”

They held each other for a while longer before finally pulling apart and both of the twins were not-so-subtly wiping their face. Keyleth swooped into embrace Vex for a shorter time, but just as tight and she could hear Percy and Vax embracing and laughing about something too quiet for her to hear. 

The quartet finally separated, and Keyleth opened up the Sun Tree. Vex could see, briefly, the wind-swept mountain top of Zephra, and she almost lurched forward to throw herself through the portal as she always had when Keyleth communed with the Sun Tree in this way. Instead, she watched Keyleth and Vax leap through, and the tree trunk close behind them, and she was left behind. Percy’s hand snaked into hers, and she clutched it like a lifeline. 

The two of them stood there for perhaps too long, Vex just looking at the Sun Tree, thinking about her brother, and their childhood, and their years on the road, and everything they had just done. 

“Come on, darling,” Percy said softly, eventually, “Let’s go home.”

Vex tore her eyes away from the closed tree, and looked at her lover. He looked full of trepidation - she had always been able to see more on Percy’s face than he perhaps intended for people to see - and she thought she could see him wondering if he would be enough for her, without her brother.

She leaned in and kissed the corner of his mouth, smiling a bit brighter than she felt at the moment. His expression cleared, though, which did cheer her. 

“Let’s go home.”

They set off back towards Castle Whitestone, still hand in hand, the sun rising on a new day for a new chapter of Vox Machina - one a bit more scattered, but hopefully more peaceful. 

* * *

It became abundantly clear over the next month or so that Vex needed a project to keep herself from going mad, and driving everyone around her mad with her. Recruiting for the Grey Hunt was a fine diversion, but it was one that required patience, and waiting, and that wasn’t something that Vex felt herself in possession of these days.

It was Taryon who reminded her that she did have a house that needed to be rebuilt. 

He reminded her of this while asking if he could crash with her, but it was a welcome distraction regardless of how it came to her. 

Percival, dear man that he was, helped her draft the layout of the house, put her in contact with the contractors who would actually do the majority of the construction, and Taryon helped her decorate...certain parts of the house. 

His taste was a little ostentatious for her, but he meant well, and he’d been raised in nobility, and Vex wasn’t so naive to think that there weren’t certain standards that she would be expected to rise to when she was entertaining people in her grand new house.

Percy moved in almost as soon as the building was livable, which was surprising to exactly no one. She’d asked that the attic be left spacious, airy, and empty for a reason, so that he could move his work materials up there and still see the light of the sun sometimes. It was a wonder that he hadn’t put it together yet. But her beloved was remarkably slow for all his intelligence sometimes, and she loved him for it, and she wasn’t going to ruin the surprise. Percy did so love figuring out surprises and puzzles, and who was she to take that away from him? 

* * *

The house was built to such a standard as being liveable within a three months - between the arcane masters, the numerous unemployed Whitestone citizens who were more than eager for an opportunity to work for coin and satisfaction, and Percy’s ingenuity, the manor was constructed much faster than Greyskull Keep had been. 

“Liveable” didn’t necessarily mean “enjoyable” but that was where Taryon came in; he was such a dear about suggesting things to liven up the place and make it more comfortable without making her feel inferior for not having known about it ahead of time. 

Living with Tary was an unexpected joy. At first, she’d accepted mostly out of her inability to see the poor man out on the streets when he was so clearly lost on his own - and he was truly on his own, without Doty, who’s replacement was in pieces in Percival’s workshop - but it was good to have someone around who wasn’t Percy. She loved him with everything in her (when she said that her heart was his, she’d meant it) but she was used to living with more people. It was good to have a friend, someone who was something within striking distance of a brother - close enough to be comfortable, but not too close as to make her feel guilty for replacing her twin.

And of course Vax was in Whitestone often enough that she couldn’t get around to really, deeply missing him.

Retirement was, Vex'ahlia had decided, soaking in her own bathtub, recently installed (a housewarming gift from dear Cass), pretty damn good. 

* * *

The next morning brought Vex out of her bed - stumbling over Percy, who was loath to let go of her when he was asleep - and bolting to the little water closet they’d had installed within the mistress’s chambers. She barely made it into the room before she lost the contents of her stomach in a more violent manner than she’d ever experienced before. There had been childhood illnesses in Byroden, and there had been spoiled food on the road from Syngorn, and there had been poisons and magic on campaign that had left her retching before, but this was a new feeling. Namely, it didn’t subside after getting sick - Vex desperately pulled her hair up and out of her face to keep it from falling in the chamber pot with her own sick when she felt it coming across her again. 

She was getting sick as quietly as she could manage when she heard thundering footsteps down the hallway, and the familiar sound of a pistol round clicking into place. Her dramatic exit from their bed had almost certainly woken Percival, but in the moment she hadn’t thought about that. 

“Vex'ahlia!” he shouted, far too loud for her pounding head and turbulent stomach. She still slept with her earring in - as far as she knew they all did, out of habit and security more than anything - and she’d never regretted it until now, when she could hear his voice twice, physically outside of the door, and also reverberating in her earring. 

“In here, Perc-”  
Her feeble attempt to alert him of her location was cut off by another gag and retch. It was enough, though, and the door opened and she sensed more than saw that Percy was taking up most of the doorway, sighting and ready to take a shot at anything that had dragged her out of their bed at a gods-awful time in the morning.   
“Vex, what’s-”

Smart man that he was, he put the scene together and figured out that, no, nothing from their shadowy past had come back to haunt them and take her away from him, she was just puking her guts out in the middle of the night.

This, it turned out, was a scene Percy was much more ill-equipped to handle.

“What-”  
“I’m getting sick, darling,” she managed, trembling and fighting the bile that was rising in her throat even as she spoke, “Be a dear and hold my hair back?”

He was spurred into action at that - she could hear the gun clatter onto the ground as he surged forward, kneeling on the cold tile floor to gather her hair so that Vex could continue to vomit in peace. 

It went on for a while longer, and when Vex finally felt herself well and truly spent, exhausted and trembling and sweating despite her chills, she discovered that he had braided her hair back. _Restless hands,_ she thought, fondly, somehow, and it was a clumsier braid than she might have gotten from her brother, but it was functional, and it was Percy’s, and she loved him for it.

“I think I’m done,” she announced, after a good two minutes without any more bile, “but if you’d be a dear and help me up?”  
“Of course, of course-”

He rushed to help her, forced himself to be steady and gentle and slow, almost left the pistol on the ground before snatching it up and tucking it- somewhere, she couldn’t see where - and returning his warm hand to the small of her back as he helped her off the position she’d assumed on the ground.

“Do you- do you need me to get you anything?”   
  
Percy seemed a little useless, now, and desperately wanted to rectify that. She could see now that he wasn’t even wearing his glasses. What he thought he was going to shoot without those, she was unsure, but she appreciated the thought nonetheless. 

“Just some water would be lovely, darling, the inside of my mouth tastes truly horrible. Maybe some ice if we still have some.”

He nodded so vigorously she was sure he was going to set something loose in there.

She smiled, a little, at the thought. It was a small, sad, fond smile. That was something her mother had told the two of them, when they were young and full of boundless energy. 

He helped her into bed, and made sure she laid on her side, and fussed over her until her maidservant brought up the water and bucket of ice he had ordered for her. 

“Percy?” she asked, and her voice came out much smaller and younger-sounding than she intended it to.  
“Yes, darling?” He was still kneeling by the side of their bed, stroking her sweaty hair out of her face, tracing her cheekbone with his thumb. She leaned into his touch and did not think about another hand, a much softer one, with a different type of love but just as fierce as Percival’s, one she hadn’t felt in a very long time, doing the same thing on a much younger Vex’halia. 

She thought about it a little bit.

“Can you get Trinket?” 

He huffed a laugh, exhaustion finally tinging his face and his voice. He looked younger, more open, without his glasses. His eyes were slightly out of focus, and he was rumpled around the edges, softer. She quite liked this sleepier Percival.

“Of course, darling.”

And he kissed her forehead before going to where her bear cub slept - inside, of course, he wasn’t some wild beast. 

Vex made a valiant effort to stay awake until he got back, but she failed against this particular struggle and was softly snoring when her bear and her lover came back in the room to surround her with love and protection. 

* * *

She woke up in the morning - properly, this time, no mad dash to the water closet - and almost forgot about their late night adventure. If it wasn’t for her braid and Percy’s protective grip on her and the snoring bear on the ground by her bed, she might have thought the whole thing was imagined entirely. Vex stretched, taking an inventory of her body. It was something Pike had taught her, years and years ago, when she was first learning how to use her nascent magic for healing. Her head was pounding. Her throat burned. Her stomach hurt. Her thighs were a bit sore, and her knees weren’t bruised, but they did feel a little bruised. She felt a little nauseated, but there was nothing left for her to lose, so Vex'ahlia told herself to be brave and to sit up. 

She swung her feet over the edge and stood, a little shaky, very hungry, and patted Trinket absently as she walked past him. He woke a little and rumbled in response to her touch, but settled back down easily enough. Percy turned over when she extradited herself from her grip, but otherwise stayed asleep as well. Vex made her way down the stairs and grabbed an apple off the counter in her spacious kitchen. Whitestone apples were crisp, like the winter air here, and she’d taken a penchant for them recently. She sat, eating her apple in the silence of the house and the bleak light of a new morning, trying to right herself within her body. 

When Taryon stumbled into the kitchen, still half asleep with dark half moons bruised under his eyes and a soft, almost invisible fuzz along his jaw, she had almost convinced herself that it was a fluke, the result of something she’d eaten that hadn’t settled well with her. Tary prepared his usual cup of morning coffee - she could feel the heat radiating off his hand; it was a magic kind of day, apparently - and though Vex had always preferred tea to Tary’s preferred strong black coffee, she’d never had a problem with it. 

The moment the scent hit her nostrils, Vex’s stomach turned and she gagged, clenching her jaw shut.

“G’morning Vex,” Tary managed, oblivious, “There was some excitement last night, wasn’t there? I thought I heard shouting.”

Vex was too busy controlling her breathing so she didn’t lose the apple that had managed to sit comfortably in her stomach to respond. 

“Vex'ahlia?” That was Percy’s voice, drifting down the stairs, “Are you in here?”  
“Yes,” she managed, strangled. Tary’s brow furrowed at that, and he stepped around so he could see Percy coming down the stairs. He stepped past her, and Vex slapped her hand over her mouth as she attempted to force the bile out of her throat.  
"Vex, what’s-”  
“Tary, what happened-”

Vex stood and once again bolted to the nearest exit - this time, to the back door, and she stood on her porch and was noisily sick. 

This time - perhaps because of how empty her stomach was - was much shorter, and Percy was by her side almost instantly, pulling her hair back and rubbing her back. He was murmuring something - she couldn’t quite understand him, but it was soothing to listen to the timber of his voice rather than herself, at this moment. 

“Not now, Taryon, we’ll be with you in a moment!”

_Pelor bless this man_ , Vex thought, _I have chosen correctly._

* * *

Tary was wearing a trench in the living room when she finally felt steady enough to return to the house. He looked up, confounded and guilty, when they walked through. Blessedly, he’d drank all of his coffee and the smell had dissipated. 

“You didn’t do anything wrong, dear,” Vex assured him, though her voice shook more than she perhaps wanted it to, “I don’t know why but your coffee just- it smelled rancid to me and it turned my stomach. I think I might have caught a bug of some sort, I was up last night sick as well.”  
“Oh, my greatest apologies-”  
“You didn’t know, Tary, it’s okay.”  
“You ought to be in bed,” Percy murmured, his hand still hovering on the small of her back, “I was surprised that you were up and around.”  
“Oh you know me, darling,” she was trying for levity and not totally hitting it, but it had to count for something, “Can’t be bothered to stay still.”  
“Well, I’m still going to call Pike.”  
“That’s entirely unnecessary-”  
“When was the last time you got sick, unprompted, before now?”

He had her there. It had been the better part of a decade and a half since she’d fallen ill with something mundane like this appeared to be. But the thought that she _must_ stay in bed, like an invalid of some sort, rankled, and she looked at him, eyebrow raised in defiance. It was a strange thing, to stare down her lover like she did dragons and demons. It was even stranger to realize he was just a hair’s breath taller than her. 

She felt her stomach churn, again, and clenched her jaw, evening out her breathing until it had settled back down. 

“If it would make you feel better,” she relented, “and since Pike’s in town anyway, presumably it wouldn’t be that big of an inconvenience.”

He was already helping her back up the stairs, so it was just the two of them when he looked at her with wide, earnest eyes, overflowing with love, and said, “Nothing is an inconvenience. Not if it’s for you.”

She wanted to kiss him then and there and it was only because of how fowl her own mouth was to her that she avoided it. 

* * *

Pike was there within the hour; Percy was fast when he needed to be. It was nice, she supposed, to be fussed over - Tary had barely left the room since Percy had left to fetch their dear gnome cleric, and he looked almost as worried as Percy had - but she was glad when the two white haired people in her life came into the room. Percy didn’t even bat an eye when he saw Trinket on their bed; he must really be worried. 

“Alright, alright, alright,” Pike said, swatting at the boys, “Out, leave me alone with the patient, I can’t work with you worry-worts hanging around.”

Tary looked suitably chastised and left, looking much like a dog with his tail between his legs, but Percy was conflicted. On the one hand, Pike was always right. On the other, he looked loath to leave her alone. Vex could see the struggle on his face and raised an eyebrow at him, making a shooing motion with her hand.

“You heard the doctor,” she told him, “You can come back in when we’re done.”

He swallowed, hard, his adam’s apple bobbing as he nodded, once, hard, and he looked like he hated it but he left without another word of complaint. He even shut the door behind him, what a dear.

“You know they’re going to be trying to eavesdrop on the other side of the door, right?” Vex pointed out, aimlessly scratching between Trinket’s ears. He’d been exceptionally affectionate today - but then, he always was when she was ill or otherwise out of sorts. Her bear was a very smart bear, after all.   
“They can try,” Pike said, grinning widely at her friend as she pulled out her various instruments and magical components. Pike had always approached magic like an art form, and Vex admired her for it. Pike was one of the few people who could make the bloody and gruesome job of healing beautiful. Vex’s own magic was practical; it was a tool, much as her knife or her arrows were. There was beauty in practicality, but Vex knew that her magic wouldn’t ever be as light and musical as Pike’s. And that was fine. Pike couldn’t have rescued the bear cub that Vex had; couldn’t have coaxed Percy out of the darkness; couldn’t have sent an arrow into the heart of a tree to purify the bog it lived in. There was beauty in what Vex did as well.

“Have you put any more thought to the Slayer’s Cake?” Pike asked, mischevious, oblivious to where her friend’s thoughts were.

Vex laughed.

“Darling, you never have to convince me to do something with you - it’s Taryon you’re going to have to work on.” 

The two women laughed, and chatted about the pipe-dream-that-was-quickly-becoming-real that was their bakery. Vex had scouted out an abandoned building that was the right size and even had the start of a kitchen in it after the last time they’d gotten together about it; Pike was the keeper of an ever-lengthening list of baked goods that were just jokes about themselves and their friends; Tary was trying not to act excited about the idea of having a bakery that he managed and made things for. It was only a matter of time until the Slayer’s Cake became a reality. 

“I suppose it’s time to get down to business,” Pike said, sighing, “What seems to be the problem?”

Anxiety suddenly clenched Vex’s stomach. What if something were seriously wrong? She explained about how the morning and night before had gone, and how Percy had just wanted to make sure that everything was fine before Pike left for Vasselheim next week.   
“Well, I’m glad he asked me over. Let’s see what’s up with you, Lady Vex’ahlia.” Pike patted her hand, and then left it there. Vex’s hand with its scars and archer’s callouses was rough and enormous compared to Pike’s, but the gnome’s fingers were light and her palm was warm and comforting.   
“So it’s just been today? Have you eaten anything strange or new?”  
“No, it’s all been the standard fare.”  
“And you haven’t felt sick until today?”  
“...Well.”  
“Vex.”  
“Not-” she was scrambling now, trying to defend herself, “today is the only day I’ve actually gotten ill! I’ve been rather tired, recently, but that’s hardly surprising, isn’t it? I felt a little unwell a few weeks ago, but it passed without incident.”

Pike hummed to herself and made a small note.

“And your periods have been normal? You finished a cycle last week, didn’t you?”

They’d lived in the wilds - or houses, or magic mansions - for long enough that they were all aware of each other’s menstruation. It had been an adjustment, at first, after having lived with only her brother for long, but it was hardly something to be embarrassed about. Keyleth had actually been rather eager to share Ashari pain relief methods for the muscle cramping associated with it; Vex had been surprised as to how effective the herbal tea had been.

“Yes, of course-”

Vex stopped and furrowed her brow, thinking.

“...Actually.”  
“Vex.”  
“Well, I- I actually…”

Vex closed her eyes and thought. It had been a chaotic few months, with the party going their separate ways, and the construction of the house, and the establishment of the Hunt, and Percy was doing so much to help run Whitestone, she could hardly sit by and watch without trying to help him as well - and there was always reading to do, about Orcus and the Raven Queen and whatever was coming their way in the future, because Vex was a hunter, and she had been both predator and prey often enough to know that this hunt was not over. Not yet. So much had been happening, in fact, that she hadn’t noticed that she hadn’t, actually, been on her normal cycle. That her cycle hadn’t started over again since they’d come back from the Hells. She’d been so grateful, then, that she hadn’t experienced that particular hell while on the Hellish plane, but-

“It’s...it’s been since the...I didn’t realize, I haven’t…”

For once in her life, Vex was speechless, staring at Pike with wide eyes. Vex hadn’t had much experience in the home and with families - her father had married their stepmother after her and her brother had fled, and she had been taken from her mother before she’d needed to know of such things - but she was well aware of how her own physiology functioned. 

Pike kept her hand on Vex’s, a constant, steady, warm, comforting pressure.

“Since when?” the gnome prompted gently.   
“Since- before the Hells.”  
“That was- what, three months ago?”

Vex nodded, wordless. 

Pike leaned forward and cupped her small, warm hand around Vex’s cheek. Her thumb couldn’t even reach the cheekbone, but she gripped Vex’s jaw, firm.

“Hey- Vex? It’s gonna be okay. I’m gonna look around, see what I can find, but regardless, it’s gonna be okay.”

The ranger nodded, still dumbstruck, but tightened her grip on Pike’s hand even as the gnomish woman pulled her hand off Vex’s face. Everything was fine as long as Pike was with them. That had always been true, and it would continue to be.

They were silent as Pike cast some sort of spell - something more complicated than Vex would ever be able to perform - that made her eyes go white and her hands glow with divine energy. Vex could feel the warmth of the magic wash over her, comfort her - the low-lying nausea that she had attributed to anxiety eased, and the exhaustion of the past few weeks relented - and Vex felt at peace for the first time since the Chroma Conclave attacked Emon. She could have stayed in that space forever, with just her and Pike, but eventually the spell ended, and the warmth receded, and the light faded, and Pike’s still-comforting blue eyes were back and looking so incredibly sympathetic.

“Vex,” she breathed, and in that single syllable, the half elf woman knew, even before Pike could finish her sentence, she knew in the same way she knew when an arrow was going to hit a target, the same way she knew what Trinket was thinking, the same way she knew that her brother would be there behind her, no matter what, “Vex, you’re pregnant.”

She swallowed, hard, and took a deep breath. She released it slowly, let it rattle in her chest before exhaling entirely. 

Vex realized, urgently, that she’d never even held a baby.

She didn’t realize she was crying until Pike wrapped her arms around her neck and pulled her in for a tight hug. Vex wrapped her arms around the little gnomish body, tight, grateful for something to hold onto right now, someone to-

“Percival!” she gasped, suddenly pulling back. She knew that her eyes must be wide and wild, because Pike instantly started to attempt to soothe her.  
“You can tell him in your own time, dear, of course, if this is what you want, if you need time, if you need me to-”

It took a moment for Vex to realize what Pike was talking about before- _oh. Of course._ It was worth considering, at least. Vex had heard about it before; a girl she had gone to school with in Syngorn, a few years older than her, was pregnant enough that people were whispering before suddenly, one day, she wasn’t pregnant and people no longer whispered. She’d seen the back alley shops, the kindly old apothecary women who only advertised certain herbal concoctions through word-of-mouth, and only advertised them to other women. She’d read about such concoctions before, and had always known what herbs were necessary, in case it was ever needed - for herself or for anyone she cared about.

_This is not a sentencing,_ Vex reminded herself, _you are not your mother. You are Lady Vex’ahlia of the Third House of Whitestone. You are Mistress of the Grey Hunt. You are a savior of Emon, a member of Vox Machina. This is your choice._

“I-”

She choked on the word, and rubbed at her cheeks and face as she tried to formulate a thought that used coherent words. 

“I want to talk to Percy about it.”  
“Of course, dear,” Pike pressed her hand into Vex’s palm again, “Whatever you need. I’m here for you.”  
“Thank you, darling,” Vex said, tearing up again despite herself, and hugging the gnome one more time before she stood to her shaky feet. 

Pike took the hint and left the room, and Vex could hear her loudly asking Tary to help her make tea in the kitchen, because Vex had requested it, and he knew just how she liked it, didn’t he? How many dollops of honey she preferred, because she always got it mixed up-

Vex smiled a little smile, because Pike knew exactly how Vex took her tea (as much honey as was reasonable for the cup it was in) and she loved the little gnome for the privacy she was affording the two of them now. Percy took a hesitant step into the doorway, and though he looked relieved to see Vex standing on her own power, it quickly faded into worry again when he saw the tear tracks on her face.

“Come here, darling,” she called, softly, because he wouldn’t move until she asked him to, she knew. He jumped into action right away, though, and was beside her in two long strides.  
“Let’s- let’s sit first, alright?” she said, gesturing vaguely to their bed. Percy’s hands hovered around her as she sat, perched on the edge of the mattress, but he sat when she was down.

Vax had always said she sat like a bird perched for flight, had always tugged on her feathers when he said it, and Vex’s hand was creeping to the blue feathers now. 

“Dear?”

That was Percy’s voice, pulling her out of her contemplation and back into the moment. She looked up at him, and she could see the fear and anxiety in his face, but she could see the metal, too. Percy had always been iron wrapped in silk, and though many could not see the core of him, she knew it was there. She could see it on his face now, though, and in the set of his jaw. He hadn’t shaved yet for today; there was a dark stubble there that made him look more rugged than he actually was. 

“Hi, darling,” Vex breathed, finally.  
“What- what did Pike say? Is everything alright?”  
“Yes-yes, of course, yes, everything’s alright, it’s-” her voice caught in her throat again, like a sob, and Vex pushed through it because if she didn’t say it now, she never would, and that would prove rather problematic soon, wouldn’t it? - “it’s actually, it’s actually quite wonderful, but- but surprising, too, and-”  
“Vex’ahlia-”  
“And I just want you to know that I am as surprised as you, and that I want to talk about this, and that I- I love you so much, darling-”  
“Vex’ahlia-”  
“I think we should call my brother, and Keyleth too, so we can maybe talk to them, if that’s what we decide- I want to see them regardless, I think, we can talk to Pike about it- maybe, maybe, maybe Grog could come to town and we could have the whole family together again-”  
“Vex’ahlia.”

She stopped, finally, tears streaming down her face as she looked back up to Percy’s dark and steady eyes. He put a hand on her cheek and brushed away the tears he could find there.

“I am with you into eternity,” he whispered, “I am with you in hell, and in a dragon’s pit, and in a vampire’s hold, and in my own damn pride. Whatever it is, we are together.”

That, of course, only made her cry more, but it steadied the fluttering in her throat of a fear she’d never even known about, one that had sat with her longer than any of her active memories - that she would be left like her mother was, that she would suffer the fate Elaina had never deserved.

“I’m pregnant,” she managed, more a breath than voice, but she said it all the same. The world did not collapse around her. Dragons did not attack. No one was dead, and Percival was still in front of her, holding her hands tightly. He had blanched almost as white as his hair, and his eyes were almost as wide as the barrel of his gun, but he was still in front of her. 

“You- you’re- _we_ -”  
“We made a child, darling,” she said, trying for a watery smile, “Probably about three months ago-”  
“Well, who allowed us to do something like that, we- we’re- three months?”  
“As far as Pike and I can tell.”

His mind was working towards something, and he had almost put the last of the puzzle pieces in place, she could see it all on his beautifully expressive face-

“You did your Grey Hunt three months ago.”  
“Well, yes, I did- _oh_.”  
“Oh indeed.”

She couldn’t help it. She giggled. Percy fell into laughter soon after, and they leaned into each other, laughing, a desperate sort of laughter of two people scared beyond their wits. 

“Percy, do you want a family now?” she asked once they had caught their breath.  
“I-”

He seemed lost for words with that one - very few things had ever stumped him, but this, it seemed, had.

“I...I do not think I would have thought to?” he admitted, “But now that we are here...I find myself wanting to reestablish the de Rolo family. Very much. And now that we are retired-”  
“There’s still- still Vecna to deal with, though.”  
“We’ve gone almost a year without change since discovering the damn ziggurat, who knows how long it will be until we make some kind of a breakthrough? Will we put our lives on hold for the threat of some mad-god?”

He was more persuasive than he gave himself credit for, and Vex had been inclined to agree with him before he even stepped into the room, but when he took her hand and looked in her eyes to say, “We may not have intended it, but I will love you until the end of my days and our- our children will know that same love,” she felt the last thread of trepidation about the dangerous world they lived in snap. Vex threw her arms around his neck and cried freely; Percy wrapped his arms around her waist, holding her close and secure and warm, and cried no fewer tears than she did. 

* * *

They emerged into the kitchen about an hour later, having frantically discussed their plans, occasionally bursting into tears again, with a brief-but-frantic break to search for Percy’s Very Important Projects notebook. Her head was spinning with the whole discussion - get everyone gathered to break the news, all at once, including Scanlan, his privacy be damned, have Percy move into the Grey Hunt Manor permanently and officially, delegate their various projects better, start trying to readjust the house for a nursery, and discussing their safety and the safety of their future child.

It was a weird thing to contemplate, that they would have a child soon. In six months, if she and Pike’s math was correct - and Vex’s math was always correct - there would be another person, mostly human but slightly not, and they had to prepare for this small person’s safety, because the world is still a dangerous place, and the world is more dangerous for people that they love, simply because they love them, and Vex has only known about this baby for about an hour and a half, and she already loves them so, so much.

Before they’d gone down the stairs, Percy had taken hold of her hands, almost reverent, and kissed them, so impossibly soft.

“I love you,” he told her, soft and strong and steady and unbending, “I love you, I love our family, I am here. I am with you, Vex, for forever.”

It was through sheer force of will that Vex did not start crying again - was she going to be this emotional throughout the whole process or was it just today? - but she did kiss him on the corner of his mouth again, still painfully aware of how gross her mouth feels.

“I love you too, Percival,” she said, surprised in the strength of her voice, “You are my heart and my home, and we will expand this family of ours together.”

He embraced her again, his arms strong and warm.

“We should go downstairs now, shouldn’t we?”  
“Likely. The broom is upstairs, we could escape out the window if you’d like.”  
“As compelling as that is-”

The blood drained out of his face.

“Oh gods, we’re going to have to modify the broom so you can still balance- we’ll have to make a carrying seat for the baby-”

Vex couldn’t help herself. It was too much - the whole day was too much - and he was so painfully himself, and so painfully what she had fallen in love with, and he was so earnest and so concerned about the broom-

She laughed. 

“Let’s go downstairs, darling.”

* * *

A quick and hard look to Pike as they came down the stairs had the cleric shutting up before Tary had the chance to ask any questions that they may not be able to answer quite yet. Vex didn’t think it was the most clever of ruses (“Just something that didn’t agree with me, darling, Percy is going to talk to the kitchens about it later today”) but he didn’t question her. He didn’t question her when she asked if he could help her get a message to Vax and Keyleth, didn’t question the whispered conversation between Pike and Percy regarding their goliath friend. He didn’t question the unspoken name, hanging in the air, and how they all seemed to be tip-toeing around it, but he never really questioned that one. Taryon Darington was all-too-aware that he was filling a hole that had been left by a much smaller man. 

The weekend trip to Whitestone was readily agreed to; Keyleth’s enthusiasm was palpable even through the arcane veil. Keyleth was _always_ enthusiastic, though, so maybe that was what Vex was hearing. 

Pike assured her that Grog would be there, she would make sure of it, and they still didn’t talk about Scanlan. 

* * *

It was, ostensibly, a dinner party to celebrate that her house was mostly completed, in terms of construction. It was, practically, a quiet and secret place away from the castle where they could tell their family ( _most of it, anyway_ a traitorous part of Vex’s mind whispered, and she didn’t think about calloused fingertips and charming songs and the long, recently-restored portrait hall in her lover’s castle) that the de Rolo family line had been revived in a more...intimate sense than it had been before. And anyway, Vex was not nervous. Nerves were for other people, people who didn’t have hunter’s instincts and steady hands and a flying broom, people who had never looked Death in the eye and made a deal. Vex’halia wasn’t nervous. 

Percy’s hands were shaking and he was trying to hide their tremor, like he always did right before the going got tough. When push came to shove, and it was time to shoot, Percy was as steady as her own heartbeat, and when he wrapped his trembling hands around hers, Vex took a breath. 

They had faced cultists and dragons and the depths of Hell. Vox Machina could handle a baby. 

...Probably.

* * *

Dinner was rowdy - no one noticed that neither she nor Percy were eating much except maybe her brother, but he didn’t mention anything to her during dinner and, well- it would make sense soon enough. Percy and Vex had gone six rounds on whether they should tell their siblings before everyone else, but it seemed like an additional hassle and - frankly - Percy had gone faintly green at the idea of having to tell Cass by himself. But Vex had a plan, and she always worked best with a plan: before the dessert course came out, Percy would call for their attention and Vex would say the words and Keyleth would cry and Tary would claim he knew it all along and Grog would laugh and Vax would hold her like she was a fine thing, something delicate and precious, like the most finely spun gold in the world, and Cass would try to do something with her face that made it clear she was Not Smiling and her and Percy would pretend they didn’t want to hug each other, to cling and cry about this new chance and what they had lost and Scanlan-

Scanlan, of course, wasn’t here. It wasn’t that they hadn’t tried. He was on this plane of existence, that much they knew, but they hadn’t gotten any word back. He’d left for his daughter. It still hurt, but every day Vex woke up with bile in her throat and an ache in her back and hope, real hope, blooming in the dark and quiet place of her heart, she understood a little bit more why he’d done what he’d done. Scanlan would come back into their lives when he was ready, and not a moment before. They were all playing Scanlan’s game, after all, and it was just time for him to be a part of someone else’s journey for a while.

Percy’s hand covered where hers was clenched on top of her thigh, under the table. He squeezed it, once, when it seemed there was a lull in the conversation and then cleared his throat. Vex was, technically, seated at the head of the table, with Percy to her right, but the hierarchy within the dining room at this particular moment in time was largely arbitrary anyway. Everyone looked to him, including Vex, who had gone about four shades lighter than her brother’s deep tan. Her hazel eyes were wide, and Percy gripped her hand all the tighter as he started to stutter through an attempt at a speech.

“Vex and I- well, mostly Vex- though that’s not to say I’m uninvolved- I’m quite- I-”

Vex moved her hand from her thigh to his shoulder. She breathed in, steadied her hand, and breathed out, and released. 

“I just thought you all might like to know that I’m pregnant, and of course Percival is the father, and we just found out earlier this week.”

Her words hit true, just like any of her other carefully crafted arrows, and she waited to see the impact. 

Keyleth dropped the wine glass she had been passing to Tary for him to refill, and it shattered across the table in perfect clarity. She yelped a little, and Tary looked down at the shards in a dull sort of surprise, like he had never before encountered the concept of gravity. Vex sipped on her goblet that had surreptitiously filled with water on Pike’s orders. Pike was the only person at the table who didn’t look completely gobsmacked, and she was beginning to smile one of her big, goofy smiles. 

“You- you’re- _Vex!”_ Keyleth sputtered, starting to stand and getting caught on the table cloth somehow. While she was untangling herself, though, Vax essentially materialized next to his sister, pulled her out of her chair with more gentleness than she had ever seen him treat anything or anyone (she’d never seen him handle her corpse, after all, and wasn’t that an unpleasant thought to have right now) and hugged her so tight that it took her a moment to realize he was crying.

Of course, she still noticed he was crying. Vax was a sniffler. 

“Darling-”  
“Vex’ahlia-”  
“Darling, I can’t breathe-”  
“Oh- oh, of course, I’m so sorry-”

He released her, instantly, and fussed at her feathers and brushed her hair out of her face and kissed her forehead and each of her cheeks and the tip of her nose, like he did when they were young and in Syngorn and missing their mother. 

“Oh gods, Stubby, you’re-”  
“Yeah, I am,” she said, finally, and now Vex’s voice gave out, and she sounded watery and she threw her arms around his neck for another hug, finally laughing, finally accepting the thing she and Percival had been wrapping their heads around for the past week.

Keyleth had successfully unravelled herself at this point and joined the twins’ hug and pulled Percy into it, and Tary rushed over, and Pike gestured Grog into the hug and Cassandra kneeled on the ground next to where her brother had partially-kneeled and partially-been pushed into the ground, laid her hand on his shoulder and murmured something into his ear that left the both of them grinning from ear to ear. There were questions about timelines, and some crude jokes, and some rather unrealistic wishes for the future, but for right now they were huddled together in a pile on the floor of Vex’s dining room, and Percy’s hand was tight around her own, and Vox Machina was complete and laughing and celebrating her own tenuous joy.

Well, most of Vox Machina was, at least. 

* * *

Vex was hardly surprised when Vax showed up at her bedroom door that night. Percy looked at her, an eyebrow raised, when he knocked - they both knew it was him, of course, but now Vex had to decide if she was going to kick her partner out of his own room so she and her twin could cry in the privacy of each other, but she just shrugged and flung the door open. Only the gods knew what Vax would want to do. It was, of course, the feather-laden man outside her door. He looked almost sheepish with his hair braided and pulled up for bed, and Vex was overwhelmed with her love for her brother. 

“Come in, then, darling- do you want Percy here or not?” she tried for flippant, joking, tried to eliminate any last bit of a tremor from her voice, but it was hard to fool Vax on anything.  
“Oh, yes, of course, he’s more than- it’s his room, isn’t it?”  
“Well, technically it’s her room,” Percy said, standing and stretching, “I’m just staying here for a while.”  
“Forever, yeah?” Vax asked, and that hard glint was in his dark eyes again. They were identical, the two of them, down to the hue of their eyes, but somehow Vax’s eyes always seemed darker than Vex’s. It wasn’t something she’d ever completely understood.  
“Of course,” Percy vowed, without an inch of irony or humor, and with all the gravity he’d named her Baroness with. 

Vax stuck out his hand, and Vex watched with a teary amusement as Percy took his hand and was pulled into a hug from her brother.

“We’re family now,” Vax swore, “We were already, but you are my niece or nephew’s father, and I will give- I will- Percival, I will give anything for my family and your family.”  
“I dearly hope it won’t ever be needed, Vax,” Percy told him, “I’ve quite liked having a brother again.”

Vax pulled him into a hug, and the two men dearest to her held each other for a while until Vex declared that they were making her cry and really wasn’t this whole thing about her, anyway, and they separated, laughing, and Vax ensconced her in a hug again, and braided her hair, and let her and Percy talk about their hopes and plans for their baby until early in the morning and the sun began to stream into their wide windows. 

* * *

Everyone stayed for longer than they might have, in light of the news, but eventually Vox Machina went their separate ways once again, and Vex and Percy and Tary slipped back into their normal routine. Pike left with Grog and a promise that she’d be back to check on Vex in a month or so. Tary and Percy threw themselves into the various house projects, but rather than adjusting wallpaper and building bookshelves, they were coming up with new and exciting ways to baby proof or baby _improve_ the house. 

“So I was thinking, about the stairs-”  
“Yes?”  
“It would be an absolute disaster if the baby were to fall down them, so what if we installed some sort of ramp- maybe it could curve to lessen the degree of the incline- and we could add water or something to make the landing a little softer-”  
“Tary, I think you might be onto something.”  
“Darling?”  
“...Yes, Vex?”  
“Absolutely not.”  
“...Right. Thank you, Vex.” 

* * *

Vex got sicker, and then she got better, and then she got sicker again. 

Percy was fussing around her, perched on the side of their bed, with a few slices of bread and a pitcher of water, and trying very hard to get her to consume either of those things.

“Percival if I eat or drink anything it’s just going to come right back up, there really isn’t a purpose in me eating it yet.”  
“You will still be able to get some benefit from it, and I’ve always found it better than dry heaving, at least-”  
“Darling,” she sighed, exhausted, sweaty, drawn, and gaunt, “if I eat something will you leave me alone?”  
“I will try not to fuss as much.”

Which, fair, she figured that’s as much as he can offer her at any given moment. 

She ate, and felt a little better - and, sure enough, in a few hours she vomited it all back up, but she doesn’t feel as weak, and she does manage to get her hair brushed out before her stomach turns again. And Percy is very kind about it, talking to her in a low voice and rubbing her back until she manages to fall back asleep. 

* * *

This kind of cycle persisted until Pike returned a month later, as promised, to check up on the status of things. She listened to Vex’s complaints about her sickness with sympathy, asked a few questions of both Vex and Percy - he had been permitted to stay for this one at Vex’s request - and finally returned back to her medical magic. 

“I’ve been doing some reading about- about more normal types of medical spells,” Pike explained, “Instead of just the spells I have to patch you all up when you get blown to bits, there’s some spells out there for more...specialized practices, so I’ve been studying. And- this is a long way to tell you that when I do this scan, I can tell what the sex of your baby is. If you want to know.”

Vex looked at Percy with wide eyes, and saw her surprise reflected on his face. He reached out to tangle his hand with hers. The surprise was reflected, but so was the agreement: Percy and Vex were both too curious for their own good, something that had quite literally killed her once, and the opportunity to _know_ was too much to deny when it was laid out in front of her so clearly and by so dear and trusted a figure. 

“Yes, of course,” they said, in unison, and then laughed, and Percy’s hands closed tighter around hers momentarily, and she was so in love with this man it made her feel a little silly. 

Pike’s hands lit up with their soft, white light and she let them hover over Vex’s abdomen. She frowned for a moment, and Vex felt something clench around her heart - _something was wrong, she’d lost the baby, she’s failed, she’d failed, she’d failed_ \- before realizing that Pike was saying something to her. 

“Have you been eating enough, Vex?”  
“I- what?”  
“Has she been eating, Percy?” Pike asked again, and even though she was talking towards the white-haired man, she was still looking at Vex steadily, and frowning just a bit.   
“She’s been...sick, recently,” Percy ventured, tentatively.   
“And you’ve been replacing what you’ve lost?” Pike pressed, raising an eyebrow.   
“...No,” Vex sighed, eventually, “I don’t...my appetite is gone. I don’t enjoy losing everything I’ve eaten. It’s- it’s difficult.”  
“I know,” Pike said, with a gentler tone, now, briefly touching Vex’s other hand, “But you need to try. You haven’t gained enough weight- it’s why you haven’t started to show, even though you’re almost five months pregnant.”  
“I just thought it was because the baby wanted me to maintain my girlish figure,” Vex tried for a joke, but it was - it was a hard thing to swallow, not the least because she had bile in her throat near constantly, but the idea that she was failing this thing that was wholly dependent on her was...not a comfortable thought. 

Pike just laughed. 

“The baby looks fine, but that’s because your body is pulling things away from you to maintain the baby. You have to maintain both.”

Vex only nodded. Pike had pulled her up and out of too many terrible, awful situations for her to disregard her advice. The gnome turned back to her examination, and her face cleared for a while, before her little brow furrowed again, and then cleared with a smile.

“Well- good news, everything looks fine-”

Vex and Percy both breathed a sigh of relief that she wasn’t overly sure they’d been aware they were holding, but Pike continued to talk.

“-I was wrong, though, earlier, when I said ‘baby.’”  
“...What?” Percy asked, befuddlement as to what could be in Vex’s womb other than a baby took over his expression. Vex pressed a hand to her stomach, lightly - she was a twin, Percy had twin siblings, surely that meant-  
“Babies,” Pike clarified, smiling gently, “You’re carrying twins, Vex. A boy and a girl.”

Vex’ahlia prided herself on being able to maintain a pleasant poker face in any situation, and she knew that Percy could claim something similar. And yet, when she looked over to her lover, he had tears in his eyes and _love_ \- the type of love she had despaired for the loss of when she’d taken a mask off his face, the type of love she’d felt but not seen when he fought a tree for her, the type they had given each other every time they had left this mortal coil - and she was surprised to feel tears streaming down her own face. Percy tugged her closer and kissed the corner of her mouth, laughter bubbling as he did, their tears mingling, and he leaned his forehead against hers for a moment.

“Twins,” he murmured.  
“My mother always threatened me with twins just like my brother and I,” she whispered back.

Pike had withdrawn her hand and was busying herself by gathering her supplies, but when the couple had separated again, Vex’s eagle eyes could see tears pooling in Pike’s eyes as well. It would be annoying how beautiful she looked, even while crying, if it wasn’t for Pike’s inherent goodness and beauty and also how instrumental Pike had been in making this whole unplanned addition- _additions_ to the de Rolo family as smooth and easy as possible. But she’s Pike, and Vex is much more concerned about her lover and the baby. The babies. 

“I’ll leave you two alone,” Pike said, softly.  
“Wait- Pike-” Vex looked up, reached out to her friend, clasped her hands, and begged, earnest, “Thank you. Thank you. _Thank you.”_

Pike only smiled and pressed her small hand to Vex’s.

“Of course, Vex.”

And the gnome left making barely a sound as she closed the door behind her.

The latch had barely clicked before Percy as turning her face towards his own and kissing her, fervently, reverently, across every inch of her face. Vex laughed, trying to kiss him as best she can, but Percival was quickly moving from her face to her neck to her shoulder and collarbones. Vex felt her laughter turning to soft sighs as Percy’s hands crept up to her baby bump. 

“You’ve already done it twice, darling,” she breathed.  
“Never hurts to make sure,” Percy responded, his voice a little more gruff than usual, and, well, Vex’ahlia isn’t one to argue with her partner when he has a good point. 

* * *

She isn’t less sick - it waxes and wanes like the moon outside her window - but she does better at eating and trying to take care of herself. Her body softens for her efforts - the little bump grows, and she can feel them wriggling and moving inside her, jostling for better positions like she’s sure she and her brother did to their poor mother. Vex finds herself thinking about her mother much more often these days. She remembers the little blanket her and Vax had shared, remembers counting the stitches in the quilting, the delicate little flowers around the border. She thinks about how Syldor had sneered at them for wanting to take it, not saying anything, but prompting Vax to press it back into their mother’s hands, telling her that she would need it to remember them by until they got back. 

It had disappeared with the rest of their childhood into ash and fire. 

Vax was much better at mimicking their mother’s textile skills, but she had much more time now than she had before, and she slowly begins to sew a blanket for her children. Percy sets to work as well, engineering (perhaps over engineering) the house to babyproof it and to create a nursery for their children. Their friends visit much more frequently than they might have otherwise; Pike comes to ensure that Vex is eating enough and that the babies are developing well, Grog comes to help with the heavy lifting of Percy’s machinations, Keyleth and Vax come to fuss over her, to bring bits and bobs from Zephra for the babies (and Vax cries more than Vex did when she tell him that it’s twins, a little boy and girl, just like a human woman in Byroden had carried once upon a time) and Taryon, of course, lives with them but still fusses and brings home finery and clothing and ensures that they all eat on time and well.

* * *

Vex’s balance decreases as her stomach increases, and she finds herself irritable and restless, and still they have no word from Scanlan. 

She enters her seventh month and wanders her house, rearranging the pristine nursery and refolding the clothing that has been folded and smoothed and washed once a week for the past three months. Percy is never far behind her, and Trinket has become even more protective. Her armor has been discarded, and even if Fenthras is never far from her, her loose braids and looser clothing (most of it stolen from Percy) make her feel so much different from the woman who felled the Chroma Conclave that she wonders, quietly, to herself, in the darkest parts of the night when she can’t sleep because her bladder holds approximately 3 tablespoons now and her children are determined to kick the ever living shit out of her internal organs, if any part of her life before will be applicable to her life after. If any part of her life after will be able to survive contact with whatever disaster is looming on the horizon. Because there _is_ a disaster looming- she catches it in the worried looks that Vax gives, the way that Keyleth never wanders too far from Vax, the books that Percy thinks he has hidden from her eagle eyes, books in a strange and old tongue about death and destruction. She has not forgotten what she told her brother’s patroness. 

And she worries that these children - these babies that she has carried and cared for and protected for seven long months - will come into a world that is not safe for them, and that she will not be able to protect them for any longer. 

There are no more Draconic Red tyrants to come and ruin the lives of two children with almost-elvish ears, but Vex’ahlia has learned that there are worse things in the world than the fire of a red dragon. 

So she wanders her house when she no longer has the balance to wander her woods. 

* * *

Her eighth month dawns and Vex thinks that she cannot get any larger, and yet she does. 

She absolutely refuses to talk about names, no matter how many times Percy brings it up.

“You know names are important, dear-”  
“There’s a list of, what, eighty billion de Rolo names? Leave it a rest, darling, we’ll wait until they’re born, pull out the family list, I’ll shoot an arrow and you’ll shoot one of your pistols, and whoever we hit is who we’ll name the children after.”  
“That’s not- not the worst idea-”  
“And it will keep you from bothering the woman who has been carrying your children for eight months until she is no longer indisposed by that burden?”  
“...Of course, dear.”  
“Thank you, darling. Help me up?”

* * *

The week after their last argument about names, Vex is unable to sleep. She paces a circuit around her room instead. Percy is reclining in bed, resisting the urge to hover after she’d snapped at him for doing it earlier. 

The babies have slowed down, stopped moving so much, and that is driving Vex’s anxieties up a wall even though Pike assured her it was normal, that they were just running out of room to move quite so much, that it was good, it just meant they would be here sooner rather than later. She’d been living in Whitestone castle for the past month, at Percy’s request, and it was nice, because it did mean that Vex had the benefit of twice-a-week check ups from her gnome doctor, but it also felt a little bit like she was being smothered. Vex of the Woods didn’t do well trapped in civilization. Which didn’t do much to calm Vex’s nerves, but it at least let her know that she wasn’t carrying dead children. 

So she continued to pace, and glared at Percy when he tried to suggest that she come and lay back down, snapping that she didn’t need to lay down, she needed to _walk._

She was in the middle of one such proclamation when she cut herself off with a low groan and a hand clutched to her belly. 

“Vex’ahlia?” Percy asked, alarmed, sitting up and beginning to swing out of bed. Vex held a hand up - the one that wasn’t clutching her midsection - to stop him from further speaking. 

She counted her breaths to breathe through the pain, and when the desperate clutching at her stomach finally relented, she looked up at Percy. A steely calm washed over her, one she hadn’t known since she’d faced down Thordak and _won_. 

“Darling, I need you to wake Tary up and have him send for Pike.”

For once in his life, Percy was speechless. He looked at her, eyes wide, completely dumbfounded. 

“Percival,” she tried for her best and most authoritative tone, despite the contraction (that’s surely what it was) now gripping her again, “Get Tary. Tell him to Send to Pike. Come back to me. You got that?”  
“I-”  
“ _Now._ ”

He scrambled up and out the door without so much as his glasses. She could hear his footsteps pounding down the stairs, and - a little more faintly - hear his fists pounding on a door downstairs. Vex considered - briefly - sitting back down, but even just the thought of stopping her movement right now went against every natural instincts. So she continued to walk. Percy came back in, finally claimed his glasses, and walked with her for a moment, bracing her against his own body when she had to stop for a contraction. He rubbed her back, talking low in her ear - Vex wasn’t quite sure what the actual words were, as she breathed long and slow, but she leaned into his touch nonetheless and relished in the sound of his voice. Still Vex’ahlia walked. 

An indeterminate amount of time later, Pike came in and harassed her into the birthing chair she’d brought a week ago to check how far along into her labor she was - and to confirm that Vex was, in fact, in labor at this point. When she proclaimed that things were progressing nicely, but slowly, Vex heaved herself back to her feet with Percy’s help. Pike cautioned her against tiring herself out too early, but Vex ignored her. Still Vex’ahlia walked. 

She’d been laboring for maybe two hours with periodic check ins from Pike - there was no sign of this progressing, and Vex knew that she was going to be here for the long haul - when she finally relented and asked Pike to Send for Keyleth and Vax and Grog. Hopefully Keyleth would be able to bring herself and Vax over and still be able to fetch Grog as well, because she wasn’t sure how he’d get here otherwise and - and Vex was beginning to feel a little vulnerable, and that feeling never lasted long in Grog’s presence. Pike nodded and moved aside to Send, cautioning Vex to take it easy. Still Vex’ahlia walked. 

Vax and Keyleth burst into the room not twenty minutes later, Keyleth’s hair in disarray and Vax only partially in his armor. Both were wide-eyed and desperate, and looked much more like Thordak had just personally dropped in on them compared to the reality of the situation. Vax was at her side in a moment, and Pike took Keyleth aside, and the two were quietly discussing the logistics of fetching Grog while Vax fussed over her with Percival. Still Vex’ahlia walked. 

Keyleth disappeared and reappeared some hour later, and Grog came in to talk with her and attempt a distraction. Vex laughed, and appreciated it, and if her heart felt like it might burst before Tary edged into the room, worrying at the edge of his night shirt, saying that the castle had been informed and that Cass would come a little later if they were amenable to it, then after he stayed in her chamber and talked with Percy and her brother and kept the two most important men in her life from combusting from their nerves, it was only the lack of one man - a small one, granted - that kept her from succumbing to a death by pure love and affection for her family. But Vex couldn’t think about who was here, or who wasn’t, right now - she had to focus on who would be here, and soon. Still Vex’ahlia walked. 

Pike eventually ushered the rest of Vox Machina out of the room - though Vax and Percy would not be budged, and Vex nodded to Pike that she should allow them to stay and fuss - so that Vex could get some rest. These twins were apparently firm in their decision to not make an appearance this night, and Pike assured her that even if she didn’t sleep, _rest_ was what was important for the ordeal to come. Vex wasn’t quite sure she would be able to rest, but she agreed to give it a shot for a little while. Laying down only intensified the regular-but-not-regular-enough pain, though, so forty five minutes later found her up and pacing. Pike cautioned her against it, and Vex had a personal rule about following whatever it was that Pike advised, but the advice to rest went against all her natural instincts, so. Still Vex’ahlia walked. 

Vax was reading from some book he carried from Zephra, and Vex was understanding none of the story, but it was nice to hear her brother. She allowed herself to be coaxed back to bed, and she laid against Percy’s chest and let the heat of him soothe her cramping muscles for a while. He was carding his fingers through her hair and smoothing his hand over her shoulders, and Vex was lulled into a doze - not a real sleep, because of the slow and periodic contractions she was still experiencing, but maybe this is what Pike had meant by resting. She allowed herself to doze for two, maybe three hours, before the urge to walk overwhelmed her once again and she forced Percy to help her back to her feet. Everyone else in the room aside from her lover - Vax, Pike, Keyleth - cautioned her against it, but she shook them off. Still Vex’ahlia walked. 

She had remained mostly positive throughout the experience. Grog and Tary were in and out of the room, and Keyleth had left a few times to update Cassandra, but even this transient, liminal space couldn’t shake that same steel calm that had taken her hours and hours before. Vex walked, and she talked and laughed with her family, and did not think about missing bards or mothers, and did not give in to the despair that was hanging in the corner of her eyes or the shadow of exhaustion that threatened to overwhelm her before Percy kissed her hands, before Pike told her she was doing well, before Vax brushed her sweaty hair out of her face, before Keyleth aired out the room with a gust of wind that smelled like sunshine, before Tary brought her water, and before Grog assured her, in his gruff and awkward way, that she was as strong as anyone he’d ever met. 

Vex looked out the window and saw that the sky was beginning to lighten. A new day was going to dawn, and still she walked and labored with these children that she’d been so afraid to bring into the world. 

Vex was looking out the window, not at herself or her family, when she felt a rush of something wet down her legs. She looked down, in surprise, and then up at Pike, and felt - for the first time - panic. She tamped it down, and Pike only raised an eyebrow. Vex nodded, a little uncertain, but when Pike began to clear the room of visitors, that uncertainty began to bloom into a full panic. 

“Percival-” she managed, and stumbled towards him, and Percy caught her neatly and held her steadfast, as he had so many other times.   
“I’m here, dearest,” he murmured in her ear, “I’m here. I’m here. I’m here.”

She nodded and, trembling, finally allowed herself to be brought back over to the birthing chair. Pike made quick work of getting Vex out of her shirt and pants and into a clean shift and checking to ensure that all was progressing as it ought to. She declared that Vex was dilating well, now, and that it shouldn’t be too much longer and Vex reached out, blindly, for her lover and her brother. Both men took her hands eagerly, knelt by the chair she was sitting in, and assured her that however hard she needed to grab them, they would gladly endure it. 

Pike stepped out into the hall after Vex’s contraction finished and called Keyleth back in.

“Here’s the plan,” she said, steady, calm, and looking at Vex squarely in the eye, “I’ll be catching. Vax and Percy will support you. Keyleth will help clean the first and keep them warm while I’m delivering the second, and we’ll have two happy, healthy babies within the next two hours.”

Vex only nodded, any words she might have started to say cut off by a low groan as her next contraction hit. 

* * *

The sun rose slowly over Whitestone. While Vex progressed into active labor, she was aware of her surroundings - of Percy in her ear, assuring her of his love, of his pride, of his certainty in _her_ , of Pike’s gentle instructions, of Vax’s silent reassurance and strength, of Keyleth’s quiet excitement, of the lightening sky outside her window - but years later, Vex would have to admit to her firstborn children that she did not clearly remember their birth. 

Her mind drifted, instead, to the family that they would be introduced to. 

She remembered Grog’s declaration, of his friends being his strength, and she remembered the pride of watching him reclaim his herd with them, his family. She remembered Pike, bounding through the hallways underneath the castle not 100 yards away, burning up with the holiness of her Lady, protecting all of them. She remembered Tary, helping her hang wallpaper and pick decorations for this house. She remembered Scanlan, singing and teasing her out of foul moods, out of bad luck, out of death itself. She remembered Keyleth, laughing, hair set ablaze in the sun, as she accepted the mantle of her destiny, as she ascended to become the woman they all knew she would become. She remembered her brother, at her back, at her side, in front of her, quick to make her laugh, to ease her temper, to protect her for as long as they’d been able to hold their heads up. 

And she remembered Percival, her dearest Percival, who saw her darkness and loved her despite it, who trusted her and worked with her, who believed in her, who loved her and who had come back to life for her, who had faced his own demons and walked away for the sake of _her_ and for the hope at a future that was about to come into being. 

When Pike told her that she needed to start pushing, Vex could hear her own yells turn from frustration and pain to triumph. The excitement of the room reached a fever pitch, and when Vex felt that she had reached her limit, could no longer push, could no longer labor like this, and that these babies would simply never be born - she was in the process of saying as much to Percival - Vex’ahlia remembered her mother. 

_She was three years old, had fallen flat on her face, had scuffed up her knees and splintered her hands, and she was screaming from the injustice of it all. Elaina had rushed over to her and picked her up, kissed each tear and made quick work of bandaging the scrapes on her legs and removing the splinters from her hands. She hummed a lullaby as she did, singing to soothe little Vex’s pain, and the toddler had been quieted easily by this attention from her mother. Later that day (when the pain had been forgotten but the comfort had not) Vex had asked her mother why she was always there to make it better._

_Vex didn’t have many distinct memories of her mother’s voice. Her memory of what her face looked like had faded, blurred around the edges, softened by time and distance. But this was one such memory, as sharp as if her mother had just tucked her hair behind her ears, had just finished whispering it to her._

_“When you have children of your own, my darling Vex’ahlia, you will know what I do: that there is no force on this earth that would keep me from doing everything in my power to help you because of how much I love you.”_

She heard it in her mind now, ringing, like the woman was here, holding her hand instead of Vax - _I love you, I love you, I love you_ \- and Vex struggled to take a deep breath.

“One more big push, Vex, you can do it,” Pike was encouraging her. Vex gathered her strength - felt her breath rattle in her chest - sighted her aim and _pushed._

The pressure increased, and the pain blacked out her vision for a moment, and then- and then- and then-

And then it was done, and a thin cry filled the room.

“A girl! You did so, so well, Vex!” Pike cheered, wiping the baby’s mouth clear and wrapping her up in one of the blankets placed nearby for this reason, and passed the baby to Keyleth to keep warm. Vex started to attempt to sit up, to look at her daughter, to assure herself that everything as truly alright- but her pains started again, in earnest, and it became very clear that her darling girl’s brother was impatient to join them. 

Vex felt Percy’s hands guide her back into the chair, and he wrapped his hands around her own even as tears streamed down his face.

“A daughter,” he whispered, “Lady Vex’ahlia, we have a daughter.”

She leaned her forehead against his for a moment, too weak to say anything in return, and then Pike was telling her to push, to push, to push, and Vex thought that she would be used to it, having just done this, but apparently, it wasn’t the sort of pain that one _got used to_ and Vex could hear her own strangled yelp as she felt her second baby exist her body, and heard just the beginning of a cry, and then her vision went dark.

* * *

“Mama?” she called, running through the woods outside Byroden. It had been ages since she’d been here last, but still she knew these woods better than any woods she’d ever been in. She ran until she found a break in the treeline, and she could see a little cottage, a cheerful amount of smoke coming out of it’s little chimney. She breathed a heavy sigh of relief - for some reason, Vex had been convinced that something had happened to her mother, to her childhood home, but the proof was here, in front of her eyes. 

Vex pushed through the door - it felt strange, to see this space in her adult body, because it had always seemed so large as a child - and found her mother standing in the small kitchen, humming a tune while she warmed soup on their small wood-burning stove.

“Mama?” she called again, taking a tentative step forward, reaching out to the woman as she turned back to her.  
“Vex’ahlia!” Elaina called, a smile breaking across her lined face, “You came home! How good of you, your brother will be here shortly- he said he had to go bring some friends back. Where’s that man of yours that you’re always telling me about? Percival?”   
“Percy is-” she looked behind her, certain that he should be there, “Percy is...is...I don’t know.”  
“Never mind that,” Elaina cooed, stepping towards her daughter, swooping a string of sweaty and matted hair behind her ear, “Look how beautiful you are- my daughter, Lady Vex’ahlia, with two children. I hope they don’t give you as much trouble as your brother and I gave me.”  
“I-” Vex felt her throat closing up in a sob, “We never meant to make trouble, mama.”  
“Oh, I know, darling,” her mother assured, cupping Vex’s cheek, “It’s just what children do. I never minded, not really.”  
“I don’t know what I’m doing, mama,” Vex whispered, “I wish- I wish you were here to help.”  
“I’m always with you, darling,” Elaina whispered back, bringing her daughter down to kiss her forehead, “There’s nothing in the world that could keep me from you when you needed me, love.”  
“I miss you,” Vex choked out, flinging her arms around her shoulders, managing a “I- I- I _miss_ you, mama,” before dissolving entirely into sobs. Elaina only held her, rubbing her shoulders and shushing her in that quiet and comforting way that had soothed her since before her memory started.  
“I miss you, too, dearest, but look at what you’ve become. I’m so proud of you, Vex’ahlia, _so_ proud.”  
“I wish you were here to see it.”  
“I know, lovely. But we take what time we can get, and I am so glad for the time we had. Never forget that I love you, and that I’m _proud_ of you.”

Elaina’s voice was fiercer that Vex had ever really heard it before, and her mother pulled out of the hug to kiss her daughter on the head again, and Vex could hear someone calling her name, behind her, but she clung tighter to her mother, who whispered only, “It’s time to wake up now, my little Vex’ahlia, but I’m always with you. Always.”

* * *

Vex’s eyes opened slowly, fluttering under the weight of themselves as she forced her eyes to focus on what was in front of her. Percy was holding her tight, blanched pale, and Pike was firmly calling her name, and Vax looked fairly green around the gills, and Keyleth was holding both infants, firmly wrapped and fussing because of the tension in the room. Vex forced her eyes open, and looked at her lover first. 

“Percy?” she managed, and everyone heaved a sigh of relief.   
“Gave us quite a scare there, darling,” he managed, weakly, kissing the hand he was still holding.   
“You were out for less than a minute, Vex,” Pike added, attempting at comfort, “You have a son, a beautiful little boy. They were born on either side of sunrise, it looks like.”

Vex laughed, and pushed herself up, her eyes fixed on Keyleth. To her credit, the redheaded woman was making her way over to where Vex was still, and began to help arrange the babies in their mother’s arms. Percy curled up next to her as best he could, smoothing the blankets out of their face so they could see them better. Vex trailed a finger down her daughter’s impossibly small face, and her impossibly small nose, and passed her thumb across her son’s soft cheek, and she felt her breath hitch in her throat. 

“They’re beautiful,” she managed, tearful.  
“They are,” Percy said, wonder and astonishment in his voice. He leaned against her head and kissed her temple, his eyes still trained on the babies she was holding. 

Vex, in turn, was similarly captivated by the bundles in her arms. They were impossibly small, and she was a little surprised that these small, calm infants had been the babies keeping her awake all night every night for the past eight months.

“They- they’re healthy?” Vex asked, finally dragging her eyes up from her children to Pike, who only smiled and nodded. Vex could see just the barest hint of reluctance in her eyes, though, and she was instantly and crushingly afraid. Was this what motherhood was? A constant fear and panic weighing on her chest?  
“They’re healthy, Vex, I promise. How about- Vax, Keyleth, how about we give them some space, alone?” Pike suggested, giving a sharp look to the two people still here. She began to gather the bloody towels and the basin holding Vex’s afterbirth and her various tools of the trade. “You have two healthy, beautiful children, Vex, I’ll be back in half an hour or so to talk about nursing but for right now- take some time with them.”

Keyleth nodded and started to gather her own things and exited the room soon after, but Vax took her face in his and leaned his forehead against hers.

“I’m so proud of you,” he murmured.  
“Thank you for being here,” she whispered back.  
“I love you, Stubby.”  
“I love you, too.”

And he kissed her forehead, and Vex felt the ghost of that forehead kiss she had dreamt as he stood and made his way out of the room after Pike and Keyleth. Percy helped her out of the birthing chair and into their bed, where he sat next to her and curled around the three of them. 

“Do you want to-”  
“Yes, I-” he caught himself as she started to shift one of the bundles into his arms, “My apologies, I don’t want to interrupt or- or steal them from you-”  
“I had them for eight months, Percy,” she told him, tired, smiling up at him, “They’re your children, too.”

So he took one and they leaned against each other and the headboard and simply watched their children for a while - they seemed to be content in staring upwards with unfocused eyes at the moment, and Percy and Vex certainly weren’t going to interrupt them - when Vex realized that she wasn’t quite sure which baby was which. 

“Percy,” she said, in a low tone, trying to prevent the babies from spooking, “Do you, ah, do you know which one is which?”  
“No,” he admitted in a breath, “I was hoping you had some- some maternal instinct that told you, I wasn’t looking when Keyleth took our boy from Pike while she tried to get you to wake up.”

There was still a spine of fear in his voice, however light he may be trying to keep it, and Vex knew they would have to talk about that at some point, but right now, with the early morning sun streaming into her room with her new and little family, Vex simply laid out the baby she was holding onto the bed in front of her and gestured for Percy to do the same. They both started to unwrap the blankets swaddling each child, hands hovering on either side should the baby decide that now was the perfect time to learn how to flail or turn themselves over or some other method of hurting themselves. 

The swaddle for the baby Vex had held fell just as Percy cleared his own swaddle, and they discovered that Vex had been holding their daughter, and Percy their son. 

“Oh,” Vex said, recovering first at the full sight of the infants she’d been carrying for eight months now, “Oh, darling, they’re…”  
“I’m so sorry,” Percy said, eventually, as she trailed off, his voice tight with tears, “I’m- I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have- I shouldn’t have taken that deal, I know that I was stained already, and now- now-”

He gestured at their daughter, in front of Vex, and the little horn nubs that were beginning to grow out of her unusually red skin. Her brother had been red, too, but it was starting to calm down to a nice and cheerful pink and yet still she had been that just-born red and- and Vex could see that she would probably always be a little redder than her brother. 

“Percival-”  
“Vex, I’m- I never anticipated- you must know I wouldn’t have, if- if I had thought that she- that they would have to pay the price of what I did-”

He was beginning to spiral, so Vex placed a hand on her daughter’s soft little stomach and turned to look at that daughter’s father, catching his face in her hand. 

“Percival de Rolo,” she said, her old steel creeping back into her voice, “If you say one more thing about my daughter other than that she is perfect and beautiful, I will end you before you know what color their eyes are.”

She could see - could feel, under her palm - his jaw begin to work and slowly, hesitantly, he nodded two sharp little nods. 

“She is _perfect,_ ” Vex continued, adamantly refusing to look away from his dark, tear-filled eyes, “They are both _perfect,_ and they are made so by the fact that _you_ are their father. You and no one else could have made such beautiful and darling little children with me, and I don’t want to hear another word about it.”

Slowly, ever so slowly, Percy’s eyes slipped closed and he leaned into Vex’s hands and a few of the tears she had seen earlier slipped down his face.

“I wish my family could have met them,” he murmured.  
“I wish my mother could have seen them,” she finally admitted. 

They sat in silence for another moment, and then one of the babies made a startled noise - a quick check proved that it had only been that their son had been startled to rediscover that he indeed had a hand that he was in full control of - and broke the moment between the two of them.

“Vex,” Percy said, his voice filling with something that sounded dangerously like hope and awe.   
“Yes, darling?”   
“Vex, Vex...look.”

He traced a long and delicate finger (Percy’s hands were as calloused as hers, but more delicate, less rough and war-worn) down the baby’s arm, and highlighted a faint line of light that illuminated his arm. Vex traced is up and across his shoulders. 

“It seems we both gave our children a- a parting gift from our experiences,” Vex managed to say, looking between her darling red tiefling and her beautiful glowing aasimar children.   
“A perfectly matched set,” Percy murmured, and his voice sounded like it did when he was quoting something someone had said to him a long, long time ago. 

They sat there for another moment, only looking at their children, before Vex realized rather quickly that they were probably chilly, from being so cold, and made quick work of bundling her daughter back up. Percy followed her lead easily, and the two of them were settled back against the headboard, holding swaddled bundles of soft baby sighs and all the hope for the future, Vex with her daughter and Percy with his son, in a moment.

“I suppose we ought to talk about names, now,” Vex said, finally allowing herself to sound teasing since her labor had started.  
“Oh, should I grab our things to determine their names?” Percy asked, quirking his eyebrow upward, “Introduce them to the tools of our trade early?”

Vex swallowed around the fear that suddenly gripped her heart and throat about these children - these beautiful babies she had carried for eight months and labored for eighteen hours to bring into the world - ever having to wield something like Bad News or Fenthras against the things their parents had been required to, and struck for something closer to the teasing from earlier.

“No, that won’t be necessary. I- I was thinking- I was thinking Elaina. After my mother. Elaina Johanna, if you wanted?”  
“No,” Percy said, softly running his thumb along his daughter’s forehead, “No, I think- I think Elaina Vesper would suit her quite nicely. She’ll have enough expectations on her, as the first daughter of Whitestone, I wouldn’t- I wouldn’t want to burden her with my mother’s name as well.”  
“Do you have any thoughts on what our little angel will be called?” Vex asked, softly, bringing him out of reminiscences from a past he lost a long time ago.   
“I...I haven’t, honestly. It was always expected that I would- I would create a fourth, but that hardly feels…”  
“Do you have any opposition to naming him after you?” Vex asked - in truth, because her own thoughts had already wandered that way, and she liked the idea of a little Freddie quite a bit, but if he didn’t want to, then she wouldn’t press the issue.  
“I never minded in the- in the abstract, but now that I see him, I…” he trailed off again, shaking his head, continuing to rub his thumb along his daughter’s forehead - _Elaina’s_ \- as she rapidly fell into a doze while her father steadfastly avoided where her horns would develop later in life, and Vex felt her heart break for the man who held it.

“Percival, do you think that because - because you may have influenced Elaina’s...planar affiliation, you shouldn’t be allowed to give your name to her brother?”

He did not answer, and kept only his eyes fixated on sleeping little Elaina in her mother’s arms, though tears were once again beginning to drip down his nose. He hurried to brush them away before they dripped onto the baby in his own arms, as-yet unnamed.

“Percival…” she breathed, scooting even closer to him, if that were possible, “You did what you needed to to survive, to live in this future. If you hadn’t done what you did- if I hadn’t done what I did- they might not be here. You would be...dead in a lake, or a prison, or in Hell, and I would have been burnt by Thordak’s fire before we’d ever met, or dead in a Syngorn back alley, or trapped in that tomb underground still. Your- your _deals_ that you’re so afraid have stained our daughter are the very things that have allowed her to exist.”

She watched him swallow, watched him force the tension out of his jaw, his shoulders, his arms and his hands, watched him open his eyes and look down at the baby in his own arms - not sleeping like his sister, but looking up at his parents with gray-blue eyes that would almost certainly change. If Vex didn’t know better, she would say that he understand everything they were saying, and was simply waiting to see what was going to happen, so intelligent was his look. 

“Hello, Freddie,” Percy whispered to his son, “I’m- I’m sorry for the rather mouthful of name, but I’m Percival Fredrickstein von Musel Klossowski de Rolo III and you’re to be the fourth, but I think...I think your uncle has called me Freddie long enough, and that it’s time for me to hand it to you.”

He leaned down, and kissed the baby on the nose, and now Freddie was able to drop into a doze having finally been named, so Percy leaned over to the baby Vex was holding and kissed the tip of her nose too. 

“And Elaina Vesper de Rolo, of course, but I’m not quite sure what nickname our family will land on for you- I can assure you, there will be one, but I absolutely refuse Lanie. Most undignified for the most beautiful first daughter Whitestone has ever known.”

And finally Vex’s own tears (which had been threatening ever since she’d delivered Elaina) spilled out, and she turned to bury her face into Percy’s shoulder and instead found his mouth with her own. He kissed her, and she felt every inch of his love, and his reverence, and his gratefulness in this kiss, and he showed no signs of stopping, only shifting little Freddie in his arms so he could cup her face and keep his son safe while he kissed his mother. 

They separated only by a soft knock on the door that preceded Pike coming in. 

“Everything look good?” she asked, and Vex suddenly understand the strange tension she’d caught in the cleric’s eyes before. Of course Pike had seen - Keyleth too, more likely than not - but Vex appreciated her for allowing them to discover it in their own time.   
“Yes,” Vex answered, smiling with full-brilliance for the first time in months, “They’re perfect. Bring everyone in so we can introduce them, yeah?”

Pike smiled back, relief washing over her face, and she ducked back out before herding in Vox Machina and Cassandra, looking exhausted and pensive and relieved all at the same time. She could just barely hear Trinket lowing behind Grog, obviously worried for his mother.

“Well, look at you sorry lot!” Vex declared, grinning at her family, “I’ve just had two babies and you look like Raishan could pop out of any corner! Vox Machina - I’m sorry, Cassandra dearest, you’re apart of the team now - this is Elaina Vesper de Rolo, first daughter of Whitestone and Percy over there is holding the fourth of his name, but I rather think that Freddie would suffice for now.”

And like that, the tension broke like a thread in her mother’s skilled hands and Vox Machina crowded onto Vex and Percy’s large bed to look at and coo over the babies, and to pass them amongst themselves, and Trinket puddled up at the edge of the bed, sniffing the babies and licking Vex’s face more than she had ever allowed him to do before, and even if Vex felt the sting of the missing bard more strongly than she ever had (made all the more poignant for knowing now exactly how he felt, and knowing deep in her bones that she would make the same decision he had if ever these babies required it) she basked in the glow of the sun and her family’s laughter all the same. 

**fin.**

**Author's Note:**

> This fic has been my baby (haha) since October or so; basically, I'm a hoe for babies ever after but you know what's better than babies ever after? Babies during the plot. So Vex and Percy have children in their year off, and I've just finished watching Campaign One for the first time all the way through and now I have a lot of Emotions about what the last arc of the game looks like if you include little de Rolo babies in that arc. Might write a part two to address that, but y'know. 
> 
> This always was an attempt to fill a percieved hole in the fanfic about Perchalia babies; I love me some tiefling children, but aasimar children are just as likely, considering Vex's whole Pelor situation. I personally buy into the argument that the Gray Hunt is a fertility ritual, because most things in the woods that we don't know the purpose of are fertility rituals (trust me I'm an Ancient Greek historian) and also because it makes an easy conception date. Additionally, I love wrestling with Percy's feelings towards Family and Fatherhood and Futures, but I think Vex would have a lot of things to work through as well, having lost her mother so early. It's obvious that Vex has a strong mothering streak (Trinket, the aasimar kids in the Hells, Velora, etc.) but there's a difference between being motherly and becoming a mother, so I just wanted to explore that space a little bit. 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed! I'm gonna go cry about the concept of these two babies I've just created from my brain being encased in Vecna's ribs during the final fight and how that changes the Whole Dynamic now.


End file.
